23 replies to this topic

[Elem187]

If I'm getting this right, they have a hard time developing for it because the leap from normal definition to HD but at the same time they find it the easiest out of the other consoles?

My fanboyism, i want to defend Nintendo... but I can't... 

Spoiler

OBJECTION! Clearly a contradiction!

 

 

Disagree, having hardware easier to program for is one thing, but having to design assets in higher resolutions can be more time consuming.

 

So the nerdy programming part of development could be easier (which it should because they are still using a powerpc based processor and AMD (previous ati) GPU..... since the system is considerably faster than the Wii (like up to x100 times as powerful) they don't have to make nearly as many compromises as they had to produce content on the Wii.

 

Its simple to imagine if you seperate the two sides of development, the actually programming, logic and engine with the other side the asset creation of creating character models and animating them, texturing them...... from what i gathered from Shiggy in previous statement its Nintendo misjudged how long it would take to create assetts in HD, not that its difficult to actually program for the Wii U.. The hardware is pretty similar to the Wii in architecture (both powerpc's with AMD GPU's) so the groundwork on how to work with a given processor shouldn't change too much except gaining a buttload of processing power in the process.

 

I don't think ubisoft has claimed they had any trouble developing for it, in fact they had several titles ready for launch in almost no time. Activision or WB haven't complained about difficulty. Tecmo didn't have any trouble getting a few titles ready for the system.. Indie developers are praising how easy it is to develop for and how powerful it is.... it seems like the only people are having issues with development are the people who's games don't really sell very well on the system (EA). Are we to believe small time two man development teams like two tribes think the system is a breeze to develop for, but the big house EA developers are having issues with it? Sounds like EA didn't even trying, minus criterion, who said it wasn't really difficult to program for.

 

Can we compare all the publishers and indie devs that don't have any problems with the hardware with the lonesome publisher having issues, aka EA ?

That in itself sounds like the wii u has additional potential though. Criterion probably had to utilise the gpu more to take some tasks off the cpu.

 

So its more like a PC where a developer pushes everything to the GPU (PC developers have to compensate that most of their customers probably have old CPU's so they concentrate on the GPU because thats the point where PC gamers usually upgrade first)

Edited by Elem187, 12 July 2013 - 10:49 AM.

[Chrop]

Disagree, having hardware easier to program for is one thing, but having to design assets in higher resolutions can be more time consuming.

 

So the nerdy programming part of development could be easier (which it should because they are still using a powerpc based processor and AMD (previous ati) GPU..... since the system is considerably faster than the Wii (like up to x100 times as powerful) they don't have to make nearly as many compromises as they had to produce content on the Wii.

Miyamoto is a designer and producer, he doesn't program the games he does the design part of the game, the part which is a giant jump from Normal to HD

[alan123]

How exactly can a multi billion pound/euro/dollar company have difficulty in  coping with the transition to HD ?

 

If it's so easy why are dev's & pub's not releasing games on the system ?

[3Dude]

Can someone explain how HD makes it harder to develop? I never understood that. Wouldn't it just be making things at a higher resolution with less aliasing since it would be clearer?

Most of the people responding dont understand this either, if they did they wouldnt be confused about this statement.

If you simply render at a higher resolution you will have the impression that you have an underpowered system.

With systems as powerful as wii u as opposed to wii, you can, and in fact NEED to produce vast quantities more game assets than you would with wii.

Models are vastly more detailed, much higher in polygons, much higher resolution textures, more texture layers (diffuse, luminosity, normal, specular, shadow etc) more unique textures (as opposed to simply reuse the same ones over and over again like they used too) more background assets and more detailed....

There is no shortcut to the quality art pipeline. No matter how powerful the system is, its still made by human beings. The workload for what the wii u is capable of far exceeded what nintendo had prepared for, to the extent they realized they needed twice as many people to create content as they had, else they end up with an underutilized system and an underwhelming presentation.

So thats what that statement was about the asset/art pipeline.

What this one is about, is the actual programming. Two very different subjects.


On that front... I suspect nintendo doesnt realize the vast difference in experience between the old generation and the middleware generation.

Older developers, Nintendo, criterion, frozenbyte, shin'en (abyss), people capable of creating their own game engines from scratch, find it straightforward and very easy to utilize.

Middleware using devs are dumbfounded.

A great example of this is the reveleation that the wii u cpu doesnt have an auto thread scheduler, as nintendo wanted to offer complete control of thread time priority to devs.

Many newer devs have no concept of this, as its handled automatically (but not optimally) in most systems now.

As a result it was found a surprising number of games have been running on only one cpu core.